The Destroying Angel

by Louis Joseph Vance

  VI

  CURTAIN

  Nothing would satisfy Max but that Whitaker should dine with him. Heconsented to drop him at the Ritz-Carlton, in order that he might dress,only on the condition that Whitaker would meet him at seven, in thewhite room at the Knickerbocker.

  "Just mention my name to the head waiter," he said with magnificence;"or if I'm there first, you can't help seeing me. Everybody knows mytable--the little one in the southeast corner."

  Whitaker promised, suppressing a smile; evidently the hat was not theonly peculiarity of Mr. Hammerstein's that Max had boldly made his own.

  Max surprised him by a shrewd divination of his thoughts. "I know whatyou're thinking," he volunteered with an intensely serious expressionshadowing his pudgy countenance; "but really, my dear fellow, it's goodbusiness. You get people into the habit of saying, 'There's Max'stable,' and you likewise get them into the habit of thinking of Max'stheatre and Max's stars. As a matter of fact, I'm merely running animmense advertising plant with a dramatic annex."

  "You are an immense advertisement all by your lonesome," Whitaker agreedwith a tolerant laugh, rising as the car paused at the entrance of theRitz.

  "Seven o'clock--you won't fail me?" Max persisted. "Really, you know,I'm doing you an immense favour--dinner--a seat in my private box atSara Law's farewell performance--"

  "Oh, I'm thoroughly impressed," Whitaker assured him, stepping out ofthe car. "But tell me--on the level, now--why this staggeringcondescension?"

  Max looked him over as he paused on the sidewalk, a tall, loosely builtfigure attired impeccably yet with an elusive sense of carelessness, hishead on one side and a twinkle of amusement in his eyes. The twinkle wasmomentarily reflected in the managerial gaze as he replied with an airof impulsive candour: "One never can tell when the most unlikely-lookingmaterial may prove useful. I may want to borrow money from you beforelong. If I put you under sufficient obligation to me, you can't wellrefuse.... Shoot, James!"

  The latter phrase was Max's way of ordering the driver to move on. Thecar snorted resentfully, then pulled smoothly and swiftly away. Maxwaved a jaunty farewell with a lemon-coloured hand, over the back of thetonneau.

  Whitaker went up to his room in a reflective mood in which thetheatrical man had little place, and began leisurely to prepare hisperson for ceremonious clothing--preparations which, at first, consistedin nothing more strenuous than finding a pipe and sitting down to stareout of the window. He was in no hurry--he had still an hour and a halfbefore he was due at the Knickerbocker--and the afternoon's employmenthad furnished him with a great deal of material to stimulate histhoughts.

  Since his arrival in New York he had fallen into the habit of seekingthe view from his window when in meditative humour. The vast sweep ofgullied roofs exerted an almost hypnotic attraction for his eyes. Theyranged southward to the point where vision failed against the falsehorizon of dull amber haze. Late sunlight threw level rays athwart thetown, gilding towering westerly walls and striking fire from all theirwindows. Between them like deep blue crevasses ran the gridironedstreets. The air was moveless, yet sonorously thrilled with the measuredmovement of the city's symphonic roar. Above the golden haze a drift oflight cloud was burning an ever deeper pink against the vault ofrobin's-egg blue.

  A view of ten thousand roofs, inexpressibly enchaining....Somewhere--perhaps--in that welter of steel and stone, as eternal and asrestless as the sea, was the woman Whitaker had married, working out herlonely destiny. A haphazard biscuit tossed from his window might fallupon the very roof that sheltered her: he might search for a hundredyears and never cross her path.

  He wondered....

  More practically he reminded himself not to forget to write to Mrs.Pettit. He must try to get the name of the firm of private detectivesshe had employed, and her permission to pump them; it might help him, tolearn the quarters wherein they had failed.

  And he must make an early opportunity to question Drummond more closely;not that he anticipated that Drummond knew anything more than he hadalready disclosed--anything really helpful at all events.

  His thoughts shifted to dwell temporarily on the two personalities newlyintroduced into his cosmos, strikingly new, in spite of the fact thatthey had been so well known to him of old. He wondered if it werepossible that he seemed to them as singularly metamorphosed as theyseemed to him--superficially if not integrally. He had lost altogetherthe trick of thinking in their grooves, and yet they seemed very humanto him. He thought they supplemented one another somewhat weirdly: eachwas at bottom what the other seemed to be. Beneath his assumption, forpurposes of revenue only, of outrageous eccentricities, Jules Max was asbourgeois as Cesar Birotteau; beneath his assumption of thesteady-going, keen, alert and conservative man of affairs, Drummond wasas romantic as D'Artagnan. But Max had this advantage of Drummond: hewas not his own dupe; whereas Drummond would go to his grave believinghimself bored to extinction by the commonplaceness of his fantasticalself....

  Irresponsibly, his reverie reembraced the memory he had of the woman whoalone held the key to his matrimonial entanglement. The business boundhis imagination with an ineluctable fascination. No matter how far histhoughts wandered, they were sure to return to beat themselves toweariness against that hard-faced mystery, like moths bewitched by thelight behind a clouded window-glass. It was very curious (he thought)that he could be so indifferent and so interested at one and the sametime. The possibility that she might have married a second time did notdisturb his pulse by the least fraction of a beat. He even contemplatedthe chance that she might be dead with normal equanimity. Fortunate,that he didn't love her. More fortunate still, that he loved no oneelse.

  It occurred to him suddenly that it would take a long time for a letterto elicit information from Berlin.

  Incontinently he wrote and despatched a long, extravagant cablegram toMrs. Pettit in care of the American Embassy, little doubting that shewould immediately answer.

  Then he set whole-heartedly about the business of making himselfpresentable for the evening.

  When eventually he strode into the white room, Max was alreadyestablished at the famous little table in the southeast corner. Whitakerwas conscious of turning heads and guarded comment as he took his placeopposite the little fat man.

  "Make you famous in a night," Max assured him importantly. "Don't happento need any notoriety, do you?"

  "No, thanks."

  "Dine with me here three nights hand-running and they'll let you intothe Syndicate by the back door without even asking your name. P.T.A.'sone grand little motto, my boy."

  "P.T.A.?"

  "Pays to advertise. Paste that in your hat, keep your head small enoughto wear it, and don't givadam if folks do think you're an addle-patedvillage cut-up, and you'll have this town at heel like a good dog aslong as--well," Max wound up with a short laugh, "as long as your lucklasts."

  "Yours seems to be pretty healthy--no signs of going into a prematuredecline."

  "Ah!" said Max gloomily. "Seems!"

  With a morose manner he devoted himself to his soup.

  "Look me over," he requested abruptly, leaning back. "I guess I'm somegiddy young buck, what?"

  Whitaker reviewed the striking effect Max had created by encasing hisbrief neck and double chin in an old-fashioned high collar and blacksilk stock, beneath which his important chest was protected by anelaborately frilled shirt decorated with black pearl studs. His waistwas strapped in by a pique waistcoat edged with black, and there was adistinctly perceptible "invisible" stripe in the material of his eveningcoat and trousers.

  "Dressed up like a fool," Max summed up the ensemble before his guestcould speak. "Would you believe that despair could gnaw at the vitals ofany one as wonderfully arrayed?"

  "I would not," Whitaker asserted.

  "Nobody would," said Max mournfully. "And yet, 'tis true."

  "Meaning--?"

  "Oh, I'm just down in the mouth because this is Sara's last appearance."Max motioned the waiter to remove the
debris of a course. "I'm assuperstitious as any trouper in the profession. I've got it in my knobthat she's my mascot. If she leaves me, my luck goes with her. I neverhad any luck until she came under my management, and I don't expect tohave any after she retires. I made her, all right, but she made me, too;and it sprains my sense of good business to break up a payingcombination like that."

  "Nonsense," Whitaker contended warmly. "If I'm not mistaken, you weretelling me this afternoon that you stand next to Belasco as a producingmanager. The loss of one star isn't going to rob you of that prestige,is it?"

  "You never can tell," the little man contended darkly; "I wouldn't betthirty cents my next production would turn out a hit."

  "What will it cost--your next production?"

  "The show I have in mind--" Max considered a moment then announcedpositively: "between eighteen and twenty thousand."

  "I call that big gambling."

  "Gambling? Oh, that's just part of the game. I meant a side bet. If theproduction flivvers, I'll need that thirty cents for coffee and sinkersat Dennett's. So I won't bet.... But," he volunteered brightly, "I'llsell you a half interest in the show for twelve thousand."

  "Is that a threat or a promise?"

  "I mean it," Max insisted seriously; "though I'll admit I'm not crazyabout your accepting--yet. I've had several close calls with Sara--she'sthreatened to chuck the stage often before this; but every timesomething happened to make her change her mind. I've got a hunch maybesomething will happen this time, too. If it does, I won't want anypartners."

  Whitaker laughed quietly and turned the conversation, accepting themanager's pseudo-confidences at their face value--that is, as purebluff, quite consistent with the managerial pose.

  They rose presently and made their way out into the crowded, blatantnight of Broadway.

  "We'll walk, if you don't mind," Max suggested. "It isn't far, and I'dlike to get a line on the house as it goes in." He sighed affectedly."Heaven knows when I'll see another swell audience mobbing one of myattractions!"

  His companion raised no objection. This phase of the life of New Yorkexerted an attraction for his imagination of unfailing potency. He wasmore willing to view it afoot than from the windows of a cab.

  They pushed forward slowly through the eddying tides, elbowed by amatchless motley of humanity, deafened by its thousand tongues, dazzledto blindness by walls of living light. Whitaker experienced a sensationof participating in a royal progress: Max was plainly a man of mark; heleft a wake of rippling interest. At every third step somebody hailedhim, as a rule by his first name; generally he responded by a curt nodand a tightening of his teeth upon his cigar.

  They turned east through Forty-sixth Street, shouldered by a denserrabble whose faces, all turned in one direction, shone livid with theglare of a gigantic electric sign, midway down the block:

  THEATRE MAX

  SARA LAW'S FAREWELL

  It was nearly half-past eight; the house had been open since seven; andstill a queue ran from the gallery doors to Broadway, while still anapparently interminable string of vehicles writhed from one corner tothe lobby entrance, paused to deposit its perishable freight, andstreaked away to Sixth Avenue. The lobby itself was crowded tosuffocation with an Occidental durbar of barbaric magnificence, thecity's supreme manifestation of its religion, the ultimate rite in theworship of the pomps of the flesh.

  "Look at that," Max grumbled through his cigar. "Ain't it a shame?"

  "What?" Whitaker had to lift his voice to make it carry above thebuzzing of the throng.

  "The money I'm losing," returned the manager, vividly disgusted. "Icould've filled the Metropolitan Opera House three times over!"

  He swung on his heel and began to push his way out of the lobby. "Comealong--no use trying to get in this way."

  Whitaker followed, to be led down a blind alley between the theatre andthe adjoining hotel. An illuminated sign advertised the stage door,through which, _via_ a brief hallway, they entered the postscenium--avast, cavernous, cluttered, shadowy and draughty place, made visible forthe most part by an unnatural glow filtering from the footlights throughthe canvas walls of an interior set. Whitaker caught hasty glimpses ofstage-hands idling about; heard a woman's voice declaiming loudly fromwithin the set; saw a middle-aged actor waiting for his cue beside asubstantial wooden door in the canvas walls; and--Max dragging him bythe arm--passed through a small door into the gangway behind the boxes.

  "Curtain's just up," Max told him; "Sara doesn't come on till near themiddle of the act. Make yourself comfortable; I'll be back before long."

  He drew aside a curtain and ushered his guest into the right-handstage-box, then vanished. Whitaker, finding himself the sole occupant ofthe box, established himself in desolate grandeur as far out of sight ashe could arrange his chair, without losing command of the stage. Asingle glance over the body of the house showed him tier upon tier ofdead-white shirt-bosoms framed in black, alternating with bare gleamingshoulders and dazzling, exquisite gowns. The few empty stalls wererapidly filling up. There was a fluent movement through the aisles. Asubdued hum and rustle rose from that portion of the audience which wasalready seated. The business going on upon the stage was receivinglittle attention--from Whitaker as little as from any one. He wasvaguely conscious only of a scene suggesting with cruel cleverness theinterior of a shabby-genteel New York flat and of a few figures peoplingit, all dominated by a heavy-limbed, harsh-voiced termagant. That towhich he was most sensitive was a purely psychological feeling ofsuspense and excitement, a semi-hysterical, high-strung, emotional statewhich he knew he shared with the audience, its source in fact. Theopening scene in the development of the drama interested the gatheringlittle or not at all; it was hanging in suspense upon the unfolding ofsome extraordinary development, something unprecedented and extraneous,foreign to the play.

  Was it due simply to the fact that all these people were present at thelast public appearance--as advertised--of a star of unusual popularity?Whitaker wondered. Or was there something else in their minds, somethingdeeper and more profoundly significant?

  Max slipped quietly into the box and handed his guest a programme."Better get over here," he suggested in a hoarse whisper, indicating achair near the rail. "You may never have another chance to see thegreatest living actress."

  Whitaker thanked him and adopted the suggestion, albeit with reluctance.The manager remained standing for a moment, quick eyes ranging over thehouse. By this time the aisles were all clear, the rows of seatspresenting an almost unbroken array of upturned faces.

  Max combined a nod denoting satisfaction with a slight frown.

  "Wonderful house," he whispered, sitting down behind Whitaker. "Drummondhasn't shown up yet, though."

  "That so?" Whitaker returned over his shoulder.

  "Yes; it's funny; never knew him to be so late. He always has the aisleseat, fourth row, centre. But he'll be along presently."

  Whitaker noted that the designated stall was vacant, then tried to fixhis attention upon the stage; but without much success; after a fewmoments he became aware that he had missed something important; thescene was meaningless to him, lacking what had gone before.

  He glanced idly at his programme, indifferently absorbing theinformation that "Jules Max has the honour to present Miss Sara Law inher first and greatest success entitled JOAN THURSDAY--a play in threeacts--"

  The audience stirred expectantly; a movement ran through it like themovement of waters, murmurous, upon a shore. Whitaker's gaze was drawnto the stage as if by an implacable force. Max shifted on the chairbehind him and said something indistinguishable, in an unnatural tone.

  A woman had come upon the stage, suddenly and tempestuously, banging adoor behind her. The audience got the barest glimpse of her profile as,pausing momentarily, she eyed the other actors. Then, without speaking,she turned and walked up-stage, her back to the footlights.

  Applause broke out like a thunderclap, pealing heavily through the bigauditorium, but the
actress showed no consciousness of it. She wasstanding before a cheap mirror, removing her hat, arranging her hairwith the typical, unconscious gestures of a weary shop-girl; she wasacting--living the scene, with no time to waste in pandering to herpopularity by bows and set smiles; she remained before the glass,prolonging the business, until the applause subsided.

  Whitaker received an impression as of a tremendous force at work acrossthe footlights. The woman diffused an effect as of a terrible andboundless energy under positive control. She was not merely an actress,not even merely a great actress; she was the very soul of the drama ofto-day.

  Beyond this he knew in his heart that she was his wife. Sara Law was thewoman he had married in that sleepy Connecticut town, six years beforethat night. He had not yet seen her face clearly, but he _knew_. To findhimself mistaken would have shaken the foundations of his understanding.

  Under cover of the applause, he turned to Max.

  "Who is that? What is her name?"

  "The divine Sara," Max answered, his eyes shining.

  "I mean, what is her name off the stage, in private life?"

  "The same," Max nodded with conviction; "Sara Law's the only name she'sever worn in my acquaintance with her."

  At that moment, the applause having subsided to such an extent that itwas possible for her to make herself heard, the actress swung round fromthe mirror and addressed one of the other players. Her voice was clear,strong and vibrant, yet sweet; but Whitaker paid no heed to the linesshe spoke. He was staring, fascinated, at her face.

  Sight of it set the seal of certainty upon conviction: she was one withMary Ladislas. He had forgotten her so completely in the lapse of yearsas to have been unable to recall her features and colouring, yet he hadneeded only to see to recognize her beyond any possibility of doubt.Those big, intensely burning eyes, that drawn and pallid face, thequick, nervous movements of her thin white hands, the slenderness of hertall, awkward, immature figure--in every line and contour, in everygesture and inflection, she reproduced the Mary Ladislas whom he hadmarried.

  And yet ... Max was whispering over his shoulder:

  "Wonderful make-up--what?"

  "Make-up!" Whitaker retorted. "She's not made up--she's herself to thelast detail."

  Amusement glimmered in the manager's round little eyes: "You don't knowher. Wait till you get a pipe at her off the stage." Then he checked thereply that was shaping on Whitaker's lips, with a warning lift of hishand and brows: "Ssh! Catch this, now. She's a wonder in this scene."

  The superb actress behind the counterfeit of the hunted and hungryshop-girl was holding spell-bound with her inevitable witchery the mostsophisticated audience in the world; like wheat in a windstorm it swayedto the modulations of her marvellous voice as it ran through apassage-at-arms with the termagant. Suddenly ceasing to speak, sheturned down to a chair near the footlights, followed by a torrent ofshrill vituperation under the lash of which she quivered like a whippedthoroughbred.

  Abruptly, pausing with her hands on the back of the chair, there came achange. The actress had glanced across the footlights; Whitaker couldnot but follow the direction of her gaze; the eyes of both focussed fora brief instant on the empty aisle-seat in the fourth row. A shade ofadditional pallor showed on the woman's face. She looked quickly,questioningly, toward the box of her manager.

  Seated as he was so near the stage, Whitaker's face stood out in ruggedrelief, illumined by the glow reflected from the footlights. It wasinevitable that she should see him. Her eyes fastened, dilating, uponhis. The scene faltered perceptibly. She stood transfixed....

  Her eyes fastened, dilating, upon his. The scene falteredperceptibly]

  In the hush Max cried impatiently: "What the devil!" The words broke thespell of amazement upon the actress. In a twinkling the pitifulcounterfeit of the shop-girl was rent and torn away; it hung only inshreds and tatters upon an individuality wholly strange to Whitaker: alarger, stronger woman seemed to have started out of the mask.

  She turned, calling imperatively into the wings: "_Ring down!_"

  Followed a pause of dumb amazement. In all the house, during the spaceof thirty pulse-beats, no one moved. Then Max rapped out an oath andslipped like quicksilver from the box.

  Simultaneously the woman's foot stamped an echo from the boards.

  "Ring down!" she cried. "Do you hear? Ring down!"

  With a rush the curtain descended as pandemonium broke out on both sidesof it.